He stepped behind me and said, as if strangled, “Booey isn’t here.”
I faced him. Though I knew the answer, I asked, “Where’s the bear?”
“He’s…he’s with…oh God Evie…” He buried his face in his hands and slid down the wall.
I dropped to my knees and held on to him. Pressed into the curve of his shoulder, I absorbed the vibrations of his sobs. Heartache slammed into me like a fighting bull.
I didn’t know how long we clung to the shadows that darkened that room. “I’m glad Booey is with Aaron. He loved that bear.”
“I know, Evie. Christ, I know.”
We stood, helping each other find footing. Then we made our final descent from the top floor and never looked back.
In the garage, Joel and I stared at the Rubicon. Annie and Aaron called it the jumper jeep. With a five-inch lift kit and mud terrain radials, the kids rode in it like a ride in an amusement park, bouncing and giggling.
With the packing complete and the house locked up, I looked to Joel.
He lifted the two A.L.I.C.E. packs in front of him, shoved one of them at me. “Whatever you do, don’t lose this.”
Expecting about thirty pounds of weight, I accepted the pack and wasn’t surprised.
He locked his eyes with mine. “It contains all your basic survival stuff. If anything happens to me, if we get separated…or worse, you grab it. Okay?”
I threw it over my back. My five-foot six frame held it ineptly, so I straightened. “Okay, I get it. Just like your life insurance policy.”
He smiled. “Exactly.”
After loading the packs, we donned our armored vests and raised the garage doors. In the jeep, I plugged my MP3 player into the stereo’s aux jack and set up my punk rock playlist.
He backed out of the garage and locked up. When he jumped back in, Theme From a NOFX Album thumped through the speakers. The song’s catchy beat had a way of pounding away my fraying nerves. I needed its cheer.
He rolled the jeep to the end of the driveway and stopped. I hadn’t left the house since I brought my A’s home. Their last day of school.
Two months of isolation. I didn’t know what to expect. Twice, I fought an aphid and won. What if I’d burned through my luck?
He chewed his bottom lip, his eyelids half closed as he slid on his driving gloves. He taught me everything I knew about self-defense. Yet he fouled up his first close-encounter against a bug. Would his luck be better next time? And the time after that? I concealed my trembling fingers under my thighs and looked back at the boarded-up house. The house we raised our babies in.
“Stay alive. Seek truth.” I forced the mantra passed my lips.
“And do not look back.”
We were doing this. We’d be fine. Yeah, we were fine. Just fine.
The chorus clapped in. He blinked then joined the vocals. With a seemingly forced smile, he raised his voice, singing.
I wanted to share in the optimism that peeked around the shadows on his face. But to be honest, it gave me the creeps. As he backed into the street and coasted down the hill, my gut rolled with dread.
Death is as sure for that which is born, as birth is for that which is dead.
Therefore grieve not for what is inevitable.
Bhagavad-Gita
I nudged up the bill of my baseball cap and dropped my chin to let the sunglasses slide down my nose.
Overgrown landscapes swallowed the monotony of patios and sidewalks. Porches offered withered flower pots and morning newspapers that decried the end of news. Other homes crumbled, burned from pillage and rioting.
Choking sewers and decaying crops replaced the usual summer perfume of cut grass and burgers on the barbecues. And beneath the miasma of abandonment lurked the rot of the dead.
Nothing stirred beyond a tattered flag, a waving screen door, and the drift of a child’s swing. Nothing lived.
Joel slowed under a darkened stop light and dodged a large furry lump baking into the asphalt.
“A dog?” I asked.
“Or coyote. There used to be a lot of strays. Now, it’s a rare thing to see something walking around on four legs.”
Because aphids fed on all mammals. But only the lucky human genome was susceptible to mutation.
A crow perched on the exposed rib cage, beak buried in the bowels. An overturned skateboard teetered on the curb beside it.
Wreckage barricaded the road ahead. He rolled over the curb, cut through a yard. From within the warped metal, protruded a disembodied arm, a booted leg. A shredded torso folded over a car door. I shuddered, tensing more when his hand squeezed my knee.
In our bedroom community, everyone knew and trusted each other. Yet the neighbors who hadn’t perished in their homes or on their front lawns seemed to have slipped into the night. I thought about Jan, the Pump ‘N Go brute, who sold me smokes with a grunt and a bothered glare. I bet she used an insectile mouth to take out her angst on an unsuspecting customer.